Group Presentation PowerPoint

Video Rhetoric

Description: The video I used captured animal abuse from The Ringling Brothers Circus in order for their animals to perform better. In the video we see elephants being beat by bullhooks, a weapon that is also used to train the elephants. It’s clear that not only do the elephants experience physical abuse, but verbal abuse as well. For example the man refers to the elephant as “fatass”. The elephants are repeatedly beat by the bullhooks when the animals have done no harm. The tigers also receiving the abuse by being whipped during rehearsals. The overall argument is clear to be that animal abuse is not okay, and that animals are not meant for entertainment.Rhetorical analysis: I believe that this video portrayed all the rhetorical devices: ethos, logos, and pathos. Ethos is used by two sources, PeTA and the Ringling Brothers Circus; both are extremely well known throughout the world. Logos is seen by the action of abuse towards the animals, it is proof of what happens to the elephants before a show, and what happens to the tigers during rehearsal. Pathos is obvious, the beating of the elephants, and whipping of the tigers is so sad to see. The elephants weren’t doing anything wrong, and yet the received multiple blows by the men. The tigers were doing as instructed, and were whipped repeatedly for no reason. The video shows all rhetoric devices because their goal isn’t to have people feel sympathy towards the animals, it is to raise awareness and boycott animal circuses. The commercial convinces people to join the cause by showing how easy it would be to end animal circuses; just don’t go. In the video there is no music, because music isn’t needed for this video to be effective, animal cruelty is wrong.

Word Picture

Word picture description and analysis; Description In the photo I’ve provided we see a man with obvious force raising his weapon to a little seal. The man also has some type of sharp object hanging from his pant leg. The weapon in his hand is the same weapon used to “break in” elephants. It’s a wooden weapon, with a hook tied to the end. The seal is looking up at the man, and is just still. The words on the photo read “Help stop the cruel seal hunt” with “stop” in a bigger font and different color: red. In class we learned about different colors and their meaning. The setting takes place in and on ice. Everything is white but the mans clothes, the words, and seal. The only colors shown are black and red from the words, and the mans outfit, and the gray seal. It is obvious that the action of the picture is just as bold as the few colors provided. Rhetorical Analysis The ad just makes you want to go “Aw!” When I first saw it I couldn’t but think to myself that this in fact does need to be stopped. I’m not quite sure how, but it had to be stopped. The ad is obvious in using pathos to have the audience sympathize. Sympathy is a big form of pathos, and commonly used in a lot of PETA advertisements. Though some will argue that the use of pathos is not credible, PETA does involve an explanation of each time of animal abuse. So it is never really just based on pure sympathy. PETA’s ethos are made up of proof of what the seals are being used for, and how they are being murdered. PETA has an incredibly large amount of proof and information given based on each animal in danger. Their logos, consists of how many seals are killed and how many seals does it take to make one fur coat. This ad does obviously cause one to “feel” for the animal and want to join the movement because it reminds us of our own pets. Like another PETA ad read, “If you wouldn’t wear your dog, please don’t wear any fur.